


Winter Warmth

by newtypeshadow



Category: Onmyouji | The Yin-Yang Master (Movies)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-21
Updated: 2016-11-21
Packaged: 2018-09-01 05:47:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8611018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newtypeshadow/pseuds/newtypeshadow
Summary: The best place to be during winter, Hiromasa decides, is Seimei’s house.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for LiveJournal's 1fandom theme set 1 table prompt "Winter."

Winter in Heian-Kyo is bitter cold at night. Hiromasa’s heating stones have cooled by morning, and he wakes huddling for warmth, with cold feet. Leaving his blankets and furs to dress feels like suffering a loss. Walking too long outside, even in his winter clothing layers, makes his nose run and his eyes sting. His sinuses and throat are chilled when he breathes to play the flute through chapping lips.

The best place to be during winter, Hiromasa soon decides, is Seimei’s house. Within his gates, his wild garden blooms as if in summer heat, and the bitter winds slicing through the streets are turned away. Seimei’s floors feel warm, as if by magic. Hiromasa’s face and hands feel cool as he sits on Seimei’s porch, but never cold. To see Seimei always warms Hiromasa’s heart, but now it warms his body too. 

He visits often—even more so than before.

Seimei notices. With a fox’s smirk, half hidden behind a white and violet fan, he says one evening, “Hiromasa, is it me you’ve come to visit? Or my house perhaps?”

“How cruel!” Hiromasa flushes—Seimei is rude to call attention to his rise in visits and their length—and then his eyes widen. Has he hurt Seimei’s feelings? He slams his empty sake cup on the tray between them and leans forward. “Seimei!” His voice and eyes are earnest. “I would visit you no matter where you lived! And while your house is warm, it would be cold without you.” _And so would I_.

Hiromasa looks away, thrusts himself back against the pillar, hoping once again that Seimei cannot read his thoughts or see them on his face. He thinks of writing a poem for Seimei about this warmth, but quashes the thought before a poem forms; Seimei hates love poetry, says Hiromasa’s poems are merely decent—though his lips quirk as he says so, suggesting what he really thinks. Hiromasa can’t court Seimei in any way he knows from life among the nobility. Seimei thinks court etiquette, courtly love and its formality, and courtly rank, are silly trifles those with airs enforce to mask the time they waste. Although Seimei will never see Hiromasa as more than a friend—this much is clear by his lack of jealousy at Hiromasa’s many lovelorn declarations for ladies he’s met the past few years—Hiromasa would hate for Seimei to think Hiromasa’s regard for him less than even that friendship Hiromasa so treasures.

Seimei’s fan snaps shut. When Hiromasa looks up, Seimei’s shrewd eyes pierce him. “You are too kind,” he says at last, tapping his fan to his cheek with a smile. Abruptly, he refills both cups and raises his. “To many more visits,” he says, and drains his cup.

Hiromasa echoes him with a smile.

That night, Hiromasa’s boots feel warm even walking outside to his ox cart. He finds identical spells in each when he gets home. Curious, he tucks the scripts into his sleep robes and onto his bedroll that night. The next morning he wakes with a smile, stretched out, with warm feet. He tucks the spells back into his shoes, eats breakfast, and returns to Seimei’s house.


End file.
